c. 1997 Religion News Service

UNDATED _ Earlier this year, a Methodist pastor in Wauwatosa, Wis., noticed his congregation was shrinking: The choir director had to cancel performances because there weren’t enough voices and Sunday school teachers saw drops in attendance.

The Rev. John Sumwalt didn’t have to look hard to find the culprit _ his missing parishioners were at the local soccer field.

The problem developed over the last decade, Sumwalt said, but it wasn’t until this year the complaints of parents and grandparents finally reached a crescendo. Sumwalt and 32 other clergy took action by drafting a letter calling for a ban on soccer and all other non-religious activities on Sunday mornings.

From the tidy, Tudor-home lined streets of suburban New York to remote communities in California’s redwood forest region, soccer has staked its claim as the youth sport of the 1990s.

Today, boys and girls are just as likely to tumble out of minivans donning shin guards and cleats as they are toting a baseball mitt or football helmet. At last count, 16.8 million American children were registered in soccer leagues nationwide and the numbers are rising every year.

But the explosive interest in soccer _ and a limited number of fields and daylight hours that has forced leagues to schedule more games than ever on Sundays _ has put the sport on a collision course with religion, forcing families of faith to make a difficult choice: play or pray.

In communities with large Jewish populations, the problem extends to Saturday mornings, when soccer games conflict with synagogue services.

The tension has led to community-dividing petition drives, created interfaith rifts and left families torn between their faith and their children’s athletic interests.

Religious leaders in Wauwatosa, a Milwaukee suburb, drew their line on the church lawn with a proposal to only schedule games after noon on Sundays to restore what Sumwalt called”respect for Sunday morning.” The popularity of soccer in Wauwatosa mirrors the game’s appeal elsewhere.”We have some problems with basketball, football and hockey (causing cogregants to miss church) but nothing’s like soccer,”said Sumwalt.”It’s huge.” Even the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Milwaukee has gotten into the fray by prohibiting church-sponsored leagues to play on Sunday mornings.

Hundreds of miles to the east, the bedroom community of Larchmont, N.Y., has been wrestling with its own soccer scheduling problem this fall.

Parents in Larchmont, where virtually every school-age child has played in a soccer league at one time or another, last fall circulated a petition among congregations recommending games be scheduled at times other than when synagogue and church services are held. More than 1,000 signed it.

Rev. Michael Nelms, associate pastor of Larchmont Avenue Presbyterian Church and an organizer of the petition drive, said he got involved because parents seemed to be at a breaking point over their weekend schedules.”They were torn,”said Nelms.”Families wanted to be in church, but also wanted their children to play on soccer teams. They didn’t know what to do.” The publicity surrounding Larchmont’s petition drive led ministers and community leaders from across the nation to call Nelms for advice.”We clearly touched a nerve,”said Nelms, who heard from folks like Nancy Freemantle from as far away as Eureka, Calif.

Freemantle is the quintessential”soccer mom”: She’s had children enrolled in soccer programs for 15 years and ran Humble Soccer Association for five years. Her 17-year-old daughter”lives and breathes”soccer, she said, and wants to play at the collegiate level.

While the Eureka league doesn’t schedule games for Sunday mornings, upper level, or”elite,”teams travel hundreds of miles along the California coast for competitions, often causing families to spend weekends away from home and church. But not the Freemantles.”We’ve had to miss championship games for church. It’s a concession we made. We’re a strong supporter of not playing on Sundays,”said Freemantle, a Mormon.

Longtime soccer league organizers like Freemantle don’t see an end to the conflict.”The situation is getting worse,”she said.”The upsurge in soccer is growing along with the population.”

MJP END WORDEN